


Hit the Road, (Uncle) Jack, and Don't You Come Back No More!

by Emachinescat



Category: Psych
Genre: AU Episode Tag, Adventure, Episode: s04e03 Greatest Adventure in the History of Basic Cable, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-13
Updated: 2017-05-16
Packaged: 2018-01-13 18:13:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 16,578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1236247
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emachinescat/pseuds/Emachinescat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>OR "Strangest Hostage Situation in the History of Basic Cable." AU Tag to 'Greatest Adventure in the History of Basic Cable.' Shawn wakes up in the trunk of a car with a killer headache and some unpleasant memories: Uncle Jack, the treasure hunt, Jack's betrayal, the detectives' not showing up in time, all the guns and threats and something about misplaced moderators – modifiers, whatever – and then… they'd knocked him out, and left Gus behind as some kind of walking, talking, grammatically correct ransom note. And to top it all off, Shawn didn't even have his phone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Don't own, for entertainment purposes only.
> 
> This is an in-progress work with one chapter to go; I will add the chapter once it is written.
> 
> Enjoy. :)

Shawn Spencer was pretty sure that his Uncle Jack was supposed to be the "fun uncle". After all, what other kind of uncle would pose as his dad on career day at school and weave a bunch of swashbuckling treasure hunting stories, armed with his charm, awesome hair, and chocolate coins? Or that would leave pennies lying around to give the world a little more good luck? Or that would show up after years of silence with a treasure map to a French pirate's lost treasure and a promise of a fifty-fifty split? All of that was pretty fun.

Leaving Shawn and Gus, unarmed and alone in the woods, with two sets of armed bad guys (would it be sets? Groups? Flocks? Herds? Clans? No, Shawn was pretty sure  _sets_  made the most sense, although  _clans_  would sound way cooler.) on their tail, bad guys who, it was important to mention, hated Jack for being their partner and them abandoning them for somebody else, and who wanted the gold that Uncle Jack  _thought_  he was making off with (Shawn had managed to switch the gold in the bag with rocks during a slight lull in the chase through the forest, and now he had a bit of the gold in his coat, while Gus had the rest), however, did not strike Shawn as very  _fun_  at all. In fact, it was downright  _un-fun_.

Add to that that the guys were now saying unpleasant things about how they should "take the nephew, and ransom his ass" for the gold, and you get a ridiculously fun-less sandwich with a very unhappy Shawn Spencer in the middle, with a side of freaked out Gus, hold the "fearless".

"We don't have a choice," one of the fake agents agreed. Now there were four guns trained on him and Gus. Two of the thugs were gone, and Shawn vaguely recalled hearing a few of them muttering about getting the car, so he presumed that was where they'd disappeared to. Shawn exchanged a nervous look with his best friend but when he addressed the remaining bad guys, he projected bravado that he didn't feel.

"You always have a choice," he pointed out. "Ransom Gus's ass instead." Gus shot Shawn an irritated glare, which Shawn promptly ignored. Of course, he didn't want them to take Gus, but picking on his partner was the best way for Shawn to keep the situation light, keep a clear head, and, perhaps most importantly, stall for time. "Or you could switch it up. Ransom half my ass and half his ass."

Shawn thought that his newest idea was rather clever, but apparently the men facing them did not agree. "Shut up!"

Shawn was actually silent for a bit, nervously chewing on his bottom lip.  _Come on, Jules_ , he thought desperately.  _Where are you?_  Usually, when the situation came down to something as serious as this, help would come almost magically, usually in the form of Lassie and Juliet, sirens blazing and guns pointed, ready to save the day.

But they didn't come.

The goons were now talking amongst themselves, trying to come to an agreement about how they were going to go about getting the gold back from Jack. Shawn didn't like the dark looks they kept sending his way, and as much as he hoped that they had veered away from their ransom idea, he had a sinking feeling that if help didn't come soon, he might be in a lot of trouble.

Gus leaned in closer to Shawn and muttered, "Just give them the gold."

Shawn shot his best friend a withering look. "What? Why on earth would I do that?"

"Because," Gus said, glancing anxiously at the arguing treasure hunters, "they want to take you and ransom you for it. Give it to them now, and they'll leave us alone."

Shawn puckered his lips in thought. "I don't think so," he whispered back. "After all, these guys don't seem to be nearly as friendly as Uncle Jack said they'd be." He remembered his uncle's words: "Don't worry. They won't hurt you if they know you don't have the gold. I know what I'm talking about." Either he actually didn't know what he was talking about, or he'd really screwed Shawn and Gus over. Shawn desperately hoped for the former, but he had a pretty strong feeling that his uncle had known that they wouldn't be entirely safe with these guys, even without the gold. "If they get what they want, they'll have no reason to keep us around, especially now that we know the agents are frauds, and Mark and his cronies know how good I am."

"You think they'd kill us once they get the gold?" Gus asked, eyes wide.

"I wouldn't put it past them. I think we should play it safe for now, try to stall—"

Shawn's rushed whispers were cut off abruptly as the barrel of a gun was shoved into his face. He looked up to see Mark smirking down at him, his greasy black hair falling into his cold, hard eyes. "Having a nice chat?" he asked, glaring stonily at the captives.

"Oh, you know," Shawn said lightly. "Making plans for this weekend. You guys seen the new  _Taken_  movie, yet? We're thinking that a treasure chest of Spanish gold might just cover all our tickets. We might even be able to get some Red Vines!"

Gus hissed for him to shut up just as Mark's gun found its way right under Shawn's chin. Shawn tilted his head back, swallowing heavily at the feel of the cold metal resting on his exposed skin. He'd been held at gunpoint before, but this was different. Even when the crazy, fake FBI psychic chick had put her gun to his temple, it hadn't been this terrifying. "You've got some nerve!" Mark hissed, digging the tip of the gun into Shawn's neck a little bit deeper.

Shawn quickly masked his fear with the last thing the bad guys wanted to hear – another sarcastic comment. "Oh, my bad," he said, and he was pleased to hear that there was only a tiny warble of fear in his voice, "are you not a Red Vines kind of guy? I bet you like chocolate. Lemme guess – you'd prefer peanut butter M&Ms with your popcorn and drink, am I right?"

Shawn thought he heard Gus mutter something worriedly about him being an idiot, but he had a hard time paying attention as the gun slid from under his chin to rest on the underside of his jaw, right under his left ear. "One more word, and I will shoot your friend," Mark promised, and suddenly the gun wasn't pressed to his jaw anymore, and it was pointed right at Gus's forehead. Right between his eyes. Shawn's heart skipped a beat as Gus's breath hitched.  _Come on, Jules, Lassie. Where the heck are you guys?_

"We're running out of time; where are they with that car?" the fake Spanish government agent that was really from Argentina and seemed to be in charge (Shawn decided to dub him Señor Che until further notice) reminded Mark. Shawn glanced over at him and saw that his gun, as well as the rest of the men's guns, was still trained on Gus and him. Crap. There was no way he could try anything now.

"Right," Mark said. Keeping his gun trained steadily on Gus's sweet, chocolaty, magic head, he looked Shawn dead in the eye and said, "This is how it is going to work, Psychic. You are going to come with us. We're going to leave your friend here with a message for the police and your double-crossing uncle. They'll have forty-eight hours to get the gold to us – we'll contact them about when and where the exchange will take place, and if we get what we want, we'll return you, unharmed. If not…" Shawn wanted to say,  _You'll let me go anyways, because you really have a heart of gold beneath all of that muscle and frowniness and hair grease?_  but he wasn't about to do or say anything that would put Gus in any further danger. This was a tricky situation, because Shawn really needed to keep these guys occupied until the incredibly late detectives showed up, but he couldn't stall without running the risk that his best friend would get a bullet to the brain. These guys were desperate, and they were serious. It was a vicious cycle. "…you'll be reunited with your family in pieces."

Mark finally lowered his gun from where it was leveled at Gus's head, but there were still three guns on them. Still, Shawn took this as a sign that his best friend was no longer in immediate danger, and he began to talk again. "That doesn't sound good. My family in pieces? I thought you were threatening me, not them."

"No,  _you'll_  be in pieces," Mark growled, the look in his eyes suggesting that he was seriously considering skipping to the "pieces" part right now.

"Ooooh," Shawn and Gus intoned. "I gotcha, I gotcha," Shawn said, grinning nervously. "Man, you really gotta watch those misplaced moderators."

Gus, ever the grammarian, gave his best friend a withering look and corrected, "It's misplaced  _modifiers_ , Shawn."

"I've heard it both ways."

"Shut. Up." The gun was back, this time the cool barrel was resting on Shawn's forehead.

"Really, dude? Again with the gun?"

Mark didn't have time to answer, for at that moment, the dark sedan that Señor Che and his pals had been following them around in roared into the clearing, kicking up rocks and dirt as it screeched to a stop. One of Señor Che's men was driving, and one of Mark's goons was in the passanger's seat.

"Oh look," Señor Che said in his Argentinean-not-Spanish accent. "Looks like our ride is here."

Shawn tilted his head slightly, trying to ignore the cold metal against his head, as he looked behind him. He peered past an anxious Gus, his keen eyes searching desperately for any sign of backup. But there was no cloud of dust indicating that a car was approaching, no rustle of the foliage, no distant sound of sirens or an engine. One of the men had opened the trunk of the sedan, and he stood waiting. Shawn shifted his gaze to Gus, even as he was pushed roughly toward the truck, the gun still at his head. "Gus, buddy," Shawn said as he and his captor reached the trunk. "Take care of my hamster, Billy Zane, Jr."

"You don't have a hamster, Shawn."

"But if I did—" Shawn's newest attempt at stalling was abruptly cut off when something – the butt of the man's gun? – slammed into the back of his head. Over the buzzing in his ears, Shawn vaguely heard Gus shouting something. Shawn felt himself wobbling slightly as white dots danced in front of his eyes, and then another blow landed, this one behind his ear. This time, he pitched forward, falling head-first into the trunk, unconscious.

* * *

The trunk was shut, all six bad guys loaded into the car, their guns trained on the distraught Gus until the car peeled away, disappearing into the distance – but not before Gus was able to get the first few letters and numbers of the license plate. He considered trying to follow the car on foot, but it had vanished, and Gus had no way of knowing which way it had gone, so he opted on walking back the way he had come and trying to find help, doing everything that he could to keep his mind off the image of his best friend being kidnapped and shoved into a trunk while he just stood there, unable to do a thing to help.

Ten minutes after Shawn had been taken away, three police cars, led by Lassiter's vehicle, sirens blazing, met up with Gus several feet down the road from the clearing. They screeched to a halt, and Lassiter jumped out, his gun at the ready, as he approached the haggard and worried Gus. "Guster? What the hell are you doing here? Where's Spencer?"

Juliet was just getting out of the passenger's side as Gus shook his head sadly, and she was just in time to hear him reply, "I'm sorry. They took him; I couldn't do anything to help him. They drove off, and they're long gone by now."

Juliet's brow furrowed in concern. "Who took him?" Lassiter asked. "The fake agents?"

Gus nodded. "And the other guys – Mark and his men."

"Wait – they teamed up?"

Gus nodded again in response to Juliet's worried question. "They thought that Jack had the gold," he explained, trying in vain to keep his voice from shaking slightly, "and so they took Shawn as a hostage to get it back. They're giving us two days to get it back to them, or they'll…" He trailed off, his ominous silence speaking louder than any verbal explanation could.

"That's not good," said Juliet. Behind them, some of the officers were getting out of their cars, trying to figure out what was going on and why they'd stopped so suddenly.

"No, really?" Gus snapped sarcastically, feeling guilty for his sarcastic response almost as soon as it left his mouth. Juliet was one of the only real friends he had on the force, and she was (almost) always really patient with him, and he really didn't like being facetious with her.

Juliet either didn't notice or didn't care, and she went on, her blue eyes glinting in worry. "I mean, that they've joined together. It's going to be a versatile environment, because obviously neither group trusts the other one, and everything could go sour in an instant, especially with the prize that's at stake. And with Shawn right in the middle of it…"

"Wait," said Lassiter. "You said they  _thought_  he had the gold."

Gus nodded, secretly impressed that Lassie had managed to catch on so quickly. "We switched out the gold with rocks while we were running through the forest," he explained. "Shawn's got some of the gold in his pockets, but most of it's with me. I didn't trust him not to lose it, plus I have bigger pockets. You never know when you might need pocket space," he concluded wisely. "It's a cautionary measure of mine that Shawn has never understood."

"Strangely enough, I get you," Lassiter said. "I always have extra pockets sewn into the inside of my jackets. You know, so I have more room for my firearms."

"Brilliant," Juliet said hastily. "But don't you think we should focus on  _Shawn_? Gus, tell us exactly what happened."

"Well—"

"On the way," she amended, heading for the car again and waving for the waiting officers to get back in their own vehicles. "We should see if we can pick up a trail."

"If we don't find anything, we'll take it from there," Lassiter added. "Come on, Guster. Time's wasting."

* * *

Shawn woke up to a pounding headache, in a small, dark, stuffy, cramped place. In fact, it was so dark that he didn't realize how small it was until he tried to sit up and ended up whacking his head – again – on the cold metal lid to his prison. He then tried to stretch out, but he hit metal barriers on both sides, and that, coupled with the humming of an engine, the sensation of movement beneath him, and the way he kept sliding around whenever the movement shifted to the left or the right, led him to the conclusion that he was in a trunk, which, in turn, jogged his addled memory and reminded him about what had happened. Uncle Jack, the treasure hunt, Jack's betrayal, the detectives' not showing up in time, all the guns and threats and something about misplaced moderators – modifiers, whatever – and then… they'd knocked him out, and left Gus behind as some kind of walking, talking, grammatically correct ransom note. And to top it all off, Shawn didn't even have his phone. He'd allowed Gus to hold on to when they were running through the forest, because it had fallen out of his apparently far too shallow (according to Gus) pockets four times during their ultimately doomed escape attempt, and Gus had finally snatched it away to put in his deeper, more secure pockets for safekeeping when it had almost ended up sharing the same slimy, muddy fate as Gus's Puma.

Crap.

Shawn wasn't sure how long he'd been out, but they seemed to be on a fairly straight road now, because he hadn't been thrown against either side of the trunk in at least two minutes. Grateful at least for this small mercy, Shawn took the moment to try to work past the pounding in his skull and brought his hand up to the back of his head, wincing when he felt the sting and touched something wet. Great. He was bleeding. For a short moment, he imagined Gus right there in the trunk with him, telling him to lick it. Then he kicked Imaginary Gus out of the trunk, because it was getting cramped, awkward, and way to close for comfort with both of them crammed into the trunk. He made a mental note to tell Gus (imaginary or otherwise) that he might need to lay off the donuts for a while.

Shawn thought that he might have been hit a little too hard on the head, because his mind was wandering off into different directions, and he really needed to focus. He forced himself to stay on topic (something that he had never been good at), and tried to remember everything his father had taught him about being locked in a trunk.

_"What you would do, is you would kick out the back taillight. That way, you can create a hole so that you can look out, see where you are."_

"Okay, Dad," Shawn whispered. "Let's do this." It took a couple of tries, because his foot's aim wasn't that great, especially since they turned a corner right as he was trying to kick it out the first time, which sent his whole body careening to the right, crashing into the side of the trunk with an "oomph!" Finally, though, he managed to kick out the taillight and sent it skittering down the road. Shawn blinked at the sudden light that invaded his formerly dark prison, the bright sunlight making his headache worse than it had been to begin with. He was surprised, because after being knocked out and waking up in a dark trunk, he had had no idea what time it was, and he was relieved to find out that it was still light outside, but was not so thrilled to discover that they were on a lonely, unfamiliar road with trees all around and no distinct landmarks that he could. He hadn't been missing for very long, but he hoped that Lassie and Jules had found Gus by now and that they were well on their way to finding him. That didn't mean he wasn't going to do his very best to escape in the meantime, however.

He squinted his eyes against the light and tried to find the little cord with the light-up handle that they installed in trunks as a safety precaution, but it was nowhere to be found. He groped around with his fingers, but he couldn't even find the cord without the handle. At long last, he was able to locate the tiny wire that had once been connected to the handy-dandy trunk opener, but after fumbling with it for several long minutes, Shawn was forced to conclude that it had been snapped off so much so that he would never be able to get the stupid trunk open. Twisting around, Shawn also noticed with annoyance that there were no crowbars or anything else that he might be able to use to lever the trunk open. He stared longingly through the small opening where the headlight had once been, coming to the grim and inevitable conclusion that he was, indeed, stuck.

For the first time in his life, Shawn wished that his Uncle Jack had just stayed wherever the heck he'd been and not come back into his life – because right now, his "cool" uncle was doing  _much_  more harm than good.


	2. Chapter 2

Jack Spencer was sitting in his car, pulled over on the side of the road, looking in shock at the passenger's seat full of rocks - plus one penny, the cheeky kid - and he said, "Well done, Shawny." Frustrated, at his nephew and at himself for being so gullible, Jack threw his car into gear and was about to drive off - to where, he had no idea, but he was sick of Santa Barbara by now - and his cell phone rang.

Driving down the road, he grumbled to himself about too-clever psychic nephews and pointless treasure hunts and mutinous ex-partners as he fished for his cell phone in his pocket. He glanced briefly at the caller ID, groaning when he saw it was his brother. He really had no desire whatsoever to talk to Henry or Shawn right now. Still, he answered the phone, rolling his eyes as he did so. He  _so_  didn't need this right now.

"Henry, whatever you have to say-"

He was cut off almost immediately. " _Jack Spencer, you stupid, SELFISH -"_ Jack winced and pulled the phone away from his ear as his brother's loud, livid voice yelled angrily in his ear. He listened with mild interest and great distaste as his brother finished whatever rant he was on, not able to make out words with the phone away from his ear, but easily able to hear the general buzz of Henry's distaste.

When the noise on the other line ceased, Jack braved putting the phone back to his ear and was rewarded for his brave efforts when his eardrum wasn't busted out.

"Henry," he started in the most patient tone he could muster.

"Did you hear a damn thing I just said, Jack?"

"Not really," Jack admitted. "I was too busy trying to keep my eardrum from being destroyed."

Henry growled on the other line, but he lowered his voice as he repeated himself, venom still dripping off of his words. "You left Shawn and Gus stranded with two groups of angry thugs on their tail."

Jack huffed. "That's what you're on about? Henry, I know these guys; they're rough, but they're basically harmless. They  _thought_  that they didn't have the gold," (he put all of the enmity he felt for being bamboozled into the word "thought"), "so they were safe. Besides, what's done is done, so where do you get off calling me about something that's in the past?"

"Jack, you were wrong."

"I know," Jack said mournfully. "They tricked me. I don't have the gold."

"No, I mean - they took Shawn."

It felt like a lead weight dropped in Jack's stomach. He was ticked off at his nephew, and rightly so, but that didn't mean he wanted or ever meant for anything bad to happen to the kid. "What?"

"They teamed up, and they took Shawn. We'll have two days to get the gold to them, and if they don't get it, he'll die."

"Oh," said Jack, quite at a loss for what to say. How could this have spiraled out of control so quickly? Of course, he probably shouldn't have left Shawn at the mercy of those goons in the first place, but he'd honestly thought they'd ignore Shawn and Gus in lieu of chasing down himself, while he got away neatly with the gold. Or the rocks and a penny. Whatever. "But I don't have the gold."

"I know. We do. Gus had it with him and gave it to us."

"So why don't you trade it for Shawn and get it over with?"

"You didn't think we'd thought of that?" Henry snapped. "No, as soon as we got back to the station, the  _real_ Mexican government had its officials right on our doorstep, demanding their property back. We have no jurisdiction over the gold, and they're already on the plane to Mexico with it."

"They wouldn't let you use it at all?"

"Too afraid they would lose it to the kidnappers," Henry said, sounding defeated.

"Couldn't you declare marshal law or something on them?"

There was a silence, and then Henry snapped, "You are an idiot, Jack Spencer."

Jack swallowed. "I know," he said softly. "What are you going to do?"

"I'm not sure about me," Henry said darkly, "but  _you_ are going to turn your car around from wherever you're trying to run away, you are going to come back to the station, and you are going to do anything and everything we tell you to do in order to get Shawn back. You've done a lot of bone-headed things in the past, Jack, but this time, you've put your nephew's, my  _son's_ , life on the line, and if Shawn doesn't come out of this okay, I swear to you, I will never, ever forgive you. Now turn the damn car around and get back to the police station -  _now_."

Jack gulped and resisted the urge to say, "Yes, sir," and before his enraged brother even had a chance to hang up the phone, Jack had pulled a U-turn and was heading back toward Santa Barbara.

* * *

"Hello," said Shawn cheerily as the trunk was flung open. Four armed men, Señor Che included, were standing over him. One of them - Mark's right hand man - had a coil of rope in his hands. Shawn groaned. "Oh, come on, again with the rope?"

"Take him," ordered Señor Che, and before Shawn even had time to blink, he was being pulled none-too-gently out of the trunk. They threw him roughly to the ground, and he landed heavily on his stomach, grunting in pain. He lay there, winded, but before he was able to get his breath back, one of them had a foot on his back, pressing him into the gravel that he had just become one with.

"Mrrmph," Shawn said wisely as his face was smushed roughly into the gravel, a few of the sharper rocks piercing his skin. "Erph."

"Shut up," said one of Mark's men (Shawn decided to call him Rufus, for he was bald and had a big mole on his nose). Shawn's arms were roughly wrenched behind his back by a few of the thugs, and he felt rough rope wrap tightly around his wrists. He grunted loudly in protest, and was kicked harshly in the ribs, and he gasped soundlessly, the air driven from his lungs with the tip of the steel-toed boot.  _Ouch._

They pulled him to his feet and shoved him toward a rundown cabin surrounded by trees, their new kidnapper's haunt, apparently.

Still winded from being kicked, Shawn didn't say anything as he was pushed and prodded down the gravel walkway, through the grass, and up the rickety stairs. The door was flung open by Mark, who had apparently gone ahead with a couple of other goons to make sure the cabin was ready for their new guest. How thoughtful. Somehow, Shawn was having a hard time being grateful for the gesture, though… Maybe it was because he knew that these guys didn't exactly have his comfort foremost in their minds...

Shawn was pushed inside, and he briefly considered trying to make a break for it, but almost as if Mark had sensed his thoughts, as soon as the desperate idea jumped into Shawn's head, the gun in Mark's hand was pointed  _at_  his head, and he knew there was no escape in that moment. The men started prodding him toward a chair in the middle of the unfurnished, dilapidated room and Shawn, his voice finally returning with the air to his lungs, said, "Okay, okay, guys, I think you've made your point. I can see that you're all pretty serious about this whole treasure thing. But I'm a generous guy. How about this? You guys can… look at the treasure. Maybe even touch it, sniff it, possibly roll in it, although that seems pretty unsanitary. Just let me go, and we'll call it even."

The answer was the back of Rufus's hand crashing across his face. Shawn managed to bite back a howl of pain, as it felt like the entire left side of his face had completely caved in. He felt something warm and wet on his cheek and knew that he now had another cut to match the one already on his dizzy, aching head. He struggled to stay upright, but his vision was going in and out fuzzily after that last vicious blow. He struggled to stay in focus as he was pushed toward the chair, made to sit down, and was bound tightly to its frame.

And as much as Shawn Spencer wanted to say something, anything, a biting remark or a joke, or a sarcastic comment, his head and face were stinging in pain, he was dizzy and sick, and even as he opened his mouth to comment on this rather unfortunate situation, his eyes slid shut and everything went black as he finally, unwillingly, but perhaps fortunately, succumbed to unconsciousness.

* * *

Jack walked into the conference room at the station, palms sweating slightly and stomach rolling uneasily. Normally, the suave, fast-talking adventurer was on top of things, and he had his cool, calm, and collected facade down pat. But this was  _his_  nephew,  _his_ mistake, and  _his_  fault, not to mention his butt - maybe even his _life_ , judging by the venom in big bro's voice on the phone - on the line, depending on his actions here and now.

He hadn't wanted this to happen. Of course he didn't. Shawn might have been smart-alek and a pain in the ass some (most) of the time, but Jack still loved the kid (even if sometimes he didn't  _like_ him), and he would have never left Shawn and Gus behind if he'd thought this would happen. He tried in vain not to think about how violent his ex-partners were, and he cursed himself for getting Shawn into this situation in the first place.

Everyone was glaring stonily at him as he slunk in the room. He didn't actually know most of the people in the room. Gus and Henry he knew, of course, but the other three, he wasn't so sure.

"Mr. Spencer," said the blonde frowny woman with short hair at the head of the long conference table. "You came."

"Course I did," he said, trying to adopt a hurt tone but only managing to sound like he was half-strangled instead. "You doubted me?"

"From what your brother and nephew have told me about you, yes, I did," the lady said shortly, brown eyes burning. "You've caused a lot of trouble, Jack."

"It wasn't just me-" Jack began, but then realized just how childish he sounded and settled with sinking down into the nearest chair. "Yeah. I know. But how was I supposed to know that my partners were going to take Shawn?"

"It shouldn't have mattered!" a glowering Henry exploded, leaping nimbly, angrily to his feet. "You left your own blood out there, knowingly, with no protection! You used him as your scapegoat so that you could get away with the gold." He cursed. "I always said you were a sleaze-bag, Jack, but I never took you for the scum you really are!"

"Well you-"

"Enough!" the blonde woman said firmly. "This isn't going to help Mr. Spencer." She faced Jack with a look in her eyes that made the normally confident and belligerent adventurer want to dig a hole right there in the station floor and go crawl in it. "I don't believe we've officially met. I'm Chief Karen Vick, and the two detectives with me are Detectives Carlton Lassiter and Juliet O'Hara. You know Gus, of course."

Swallowing heavily, Jack nodded at Gus in recognition, but the young man simply gave him a look of such contempt that he might have staggered back if he hadn't been seated. Both detectives, the one who looked astonishingly like a grumpy Mr. Bean and the pretty blonde, looked positively murderous. Wow, he'd really screwed this one up, hadn't he.

"What are we going to do?" he asked weakly.

"They're your partners," the chief said slowly. "Or were. You know them better than any of us. You are going to tell us everything you know about them, you are going to think of every single place you've ever met up, any piece of information - whether you believe it to be relevant or irrelevant - you are going to follow every order, and you are going to  _whatever it takes_  to get Mr. Spencer back. Am I clear?"

Jack nodded mutely, words stuck in his throat.

Detective Lassiter spoke up. "Now, in order to find Spencer, we need to-"

He was cut off as "Eye of the Tiger" blasted through the conference room. Jack winced, grabbing his cell phone and staring at it, face paling. "It's Mark," he said dryly. His heart pounded. What if Shawn was already dead? Shot in the head, and it was all Jack's fault…

He was brought out of his horrified stupor as Detective O'Hara snapped, "He's probably giving you the ransom notice. Answer it."

"And put it on speaker," Henry and Lassiter intoned, then glanced at each other, both scowling.

With a trembling finger, Jack answered the phone and put it on speaker. "Hello?"

"Hey, Jack," came Mark's smug voice. "Have you heard the news?"

Jack glanced at the chief, who mouthed,  _Play dumb._

Jack adopted an easy tone, hoping that his ex-partner wouldn't notice the tension hidden beneath the jokes. "What, that you got outsmarted by this crafty devil? Oh yeah. I've heard."

Lassiter already somebody silently waved into the room, motioning that they needed to try to track the call. The officer nodded and hurried out of the room. Jack met Henry's eye, and his brother encouraged,  _Keep him talking._

Jack jerked his head forward in a slight nod. Mark chuckled darkly. "So you haven't. Your nephew, you know, the smart-mouthed one that caved as soon as we started giving you the third degree?" Jack's stomach clenched, disgusted at himself as he remembered how quickly Shawn had come to his defense. And what had he done to repay his nephew? Gotten him kidnapped, that's what. Jack wasn't used to these nearly overwhelming feelings of guilt, and he didn't like them one bit.

"Shawn, yeah. What about him?" Jack was amazed that he was able to keep the tremble out of his voice, but when he realized that his phone was shaking violently in his grip, he realized that the tremors must have somehow relocated to his hands.

"He's with me."

Jack cursed, which felt appropriate at the moment, even if Mark's big reveal wasn't the surprise that the man had hoped it would be.

"Just leave him out of this!" Jack protested.

"Sorry, Jackie," Mark simpered. "Can't. I was going to call and tell you that you had two days to hand over the gold, or your nephew's dead, just in case his little friend hadn't tracked you down and told you yet."

Jack furrowed his brow. "Was?" he asked, and, looking around, he saw a similar confused expression on the other faces at the table. "What do you mean, was?"

"Don't play dumb, Jack. You know full well that you were outsmarted by that brat. Now, I'm calling to tell you that the ransom's off."

Jack fumbled to find the right words. "I… you… how?" Okay, so he definitely fumbled that one.

"Found the coins in his pocket when we searched him, after he passed out," Mark informed him.

Mouth dry, trying his best to ignore the angry and worried looks at the table around him, Jack stammered, "You said you wouldn't hurt him."

"No, I said that he wouldn't die if you gave me the gold. I didn't say I wouldn't hurt him. You need to pay better attention, Jack."

"He only took a few of the coins," Jack lied. "I have the rest."

"Nice try," Mark sneered, "but after a bit of… persuasion…" (Jack did  _not_  like the way that Mark said "persuasion"), "we got him to tell the truth."

Jack cleared his throat nervously. "The truth?"

"Oh, yes, Jack. We know where the treasure is. And we're about to leave to collect it right now."

"Wait. Where is it?"

Mark snorted disdainfully. "Like we would tell you. That brat of yours told us exactly where he buried it."

Buried it? Jack glanced around at everyone around the table, and noted their puzzled, anxious expressions. What the heck was the kid playing at? What kind of bluff had he made? Voice shaking slightly, Jack ordered, "Well, if you know where it is, let Shawn go. Just tell me where he's at, and I'll come get him while you get the treasure, huh?"

"No, the kid's taking us  _to_  the exact spot he buried the gold. And then, if he's lying, or thinks he's a wise-ass and can outsmart us, and the treasure's not there, we're going to bury  _him_  in the hole we dig up instead."

_Click._

"Oh boy," said Jack faintly. "And just when I thought it couldn't get any worse."

Time was running out. They needed to find Shawn. And  _fast_.


	3. Part Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own Psych. Nor do I own MacGyver. But dang, wouldn't it be nice to own them both. :)
> 
> *shuffles into frame, head bowed low in penance* Forgive me readers, for I have sinned.
> 
> It's been far, far too long since I last updated this story. I honestly did not mean to leave it – or fanfiction, for that matter, for such a long time, and I know no amount of excuses will cover it, but… I am back, with a long-due chapter to this story I started ages ago. One of the main reasons I have been absent for so long is because I have been working very hard on my book. :) Yes, this is a shameless plug, but it's been a long time coming, and it's such a large part of the reason why I haven't been doing fanfiction for such a long stretch of time, so I'd definitely like to let you know about it. If you're interested, it's on Amazon (just $2.99 for Kindle), and it's called House of the Dead by Elizabeth Wilson. You can read what it's about on Amazon, but I'll just say, if you're a fan of fantasy or mythology (especially of authors like Rick Riordan or Neil Gaiman), you're almost certainly going to enjoy this book! :)
> 
> But I've delayed long enough, so, without further ado, I gift you my peace offering: the second to final part of "Hit the Road, (Uncle) Jack, and Don't You Come Back No More!" Warning: some violence, moderate Shawn whump in this chapter, but nothing too graphic. Of course, this is me we're talking about, so Shawn whump is kind of a given. :)

Things were going fine until they found the gold in his pocket.

Well. Not exactly _fine_ , if being betrayed, threatened, knocked out, kidnapped, roughed up, tied to a chair, and held for ransom meant anything, but it was _okay._ Sort of. _Under control_. Mostly. Mark, Señor Che, and their lovely associates had been in the dark about who really had the gold, they had given a deadline of two days, so Shawn had time to formulate a plan and the SBPD had more time to find him before things got ugly, and he wasn't in any immediate danger of being shot in the face because they needed to trade him for the treasure.

But now… well, now, it was different. Because apparently, these hoodlums had been raised in a barn and had absolutely no sense of decency whatsoever, and they'd searched him after they'd tied him up and knocked him out. Unconscious, Shawn had had no way of knowing what they were doing, and no way of coming up with a clever excuse as to why he had a few coins stuffed into his pockets when he was supposed to have passed all of the gold on to Jack.

As it was, by the time they jolted him awake with a bucket of cold water to the face, they'd already made up their minds as to what had happened, convinced that they'd been double-crossed (which they had, but that wasn't the point) and demanding to know who really had the gold. So Shawn had had to improvise, which he was pretty good at, if he did say so himself. He was like the MacGyver of words, able to formulate a creative way to get out of nearly any scrape with his big mouth and superior intellect alone. All he was missing was the feathery mullet and a dope bomber jacket, and he'd be disarming people like bombs all over the globe… and that metaphor may have gotten away with him.

Shawn spluttered awake, sucking in inordinate amounts of freezing water as he gasped from the shock of the sudden cold. Hacking and coughing like an old steamroller, he blinked water out of his eyes and tried to raise his hands to mop off his dripping icicle of a face, but found that he couldn't move – he was tied by his wrists, ankles, and waist to a rickety old chair in the center of a dilapidated sitting room. A stab of fear threaded through him, and he instinctively jerked against the bonds.

 _Don't panic_ , he tried to tell himself, but Himself didn't listen. For a few terrifying moments, he had no idea where he was or what had happened – all he knew was that he was tied up, soaking wet, and aching all over, especially on the back of his head and the left side of his face. But then Señor Che prowled into his line of vision, a handful of gold coins held out in front of him, and everything crashed into place.

Uncle Jack. Buchard's treasure. He'd been kidnapped by Jack's ex-partners and some bad dudes who were just about as Mexican government-y as Shawn was psychic, and they were holding him for ransom.

Shawn spit out a mouthful of water, collected himself, and pasted what he hoped was a convincing smirk on his face. "Hey, fellas," he beamed, his words slightly slurred by the cavern that had been punched into his cheek. "I appreciate the gesture, but if you want to go _out_ for drinks, I'm cool with that. There's this great bar just down–"

"Shut up," Mark growled, materializing beside Che.

Shawn cleared his throat. "Not a drinking man, huh? That's okay; I bet you like cucumber melon water, don't you?"

Mark's hand flew up, and Shawn instinctively flinched back from the backhand. Mark kept his hand raised, poised to strike, for a moment longer, then laughed darkly and let it drop to his side. "You're in way over your head, smartass," Mark hissed, "and I've just about had enough'a you. There's just one thing that's keeping me from blowing your brains out, so you better watch your mouth."

Shawn raised an eyebrow. "It's my rugged good looks, isn't it? The stark jawline, the regal nose, the pristinely conditioned hair?"

_Crack._

Pain – along with a disgusting amount of sticky blood – exploded in his face. Shawn cried out as he was punched square in the nose; his head snapped back and thudded dully against the back of the chair. He tasted the bile-inducing metallic warmth of blood pooling into his mouth from his broken nose and he choked, spitting blood to the side, his hands ineffectively straining against the restraints as he tried to stem the flow. He couldn't stop a tear of pain leaking from his eye.

"Gah!" he grunted, dragging his head up to meet the eyes of his captors once more. It felt like it had gained a few hundred thousand pounds in the last ten seconds, and it was not, no matter what his dad might've said if he were here – because of his ego. "Come on," Shawn gasped out (though with his busted nose, it sounded more like "cub od"), "don't hate just because my hair was bestowed by the gods."

Mark reeled back for another punch, and Shawn shrank away, mentally cursing his runaway tongue, but Señor Che grabbed Mark's wrist and halted the fist before it could connect. In heavily accented English, Che chided, "He's already taken some hard hits to the head. We can't risk damaging his brain before he can tell us what we need to know."

Mark strained against Che's hand for the fraction of a second, then shook his arm loose. "Damn," he swore, shaking out his fist. His knuckles were bloody, but if the blood was his or Shawn's, it was anyone's guess. "I really, really want to beat the crap out of this a-hole."

Shawn had promised himself he'd be a good boy and not mouth off to his captors anymore, but he was genuinely offended by Mark's words and couldn't stop himself. "Me? An _a-hole_? If _I'm_ an a-hole, then what does it make the goons who broke my damn nose?!" His normal wit had deserted him momentarily, fear and anger taking over. He spat more blood from his mouth; his nose was still flowing.

"Mr. Spencer," Señor Che said softly, leaning in just millimeters from Shawn's throbbing nose, "I do not think you understand the gravity of the situation. You see, we found this–" He indicated the gold in his hand, "–in your pocket." Shawn glanced down at the gold, now speckled with his own blood and swallowed hard. "We know that you double crossed Jack, but we also know that the rest of the gold is not with you. That can only mean that one of your friends has it, or you have hidden it somewhere. I've called off the ransom demand. Your new deadline is five minutes. You have _five minutes_ to tell us what you did with the rest of the gold, or we _will_ kill you."

Shawn swallowed again, the tangy taste of blood coating his throat; he bit back bile and waited a long moment before he spoke again. "Dude, you've got it wrong. Jack _does_ have the gold. I just took a few coins, you know, for propensity."

Mark frowned as if in deep thought. "Don't you mean prosperity?"

Before Shawn could supply the obligatory "I've heard it both ways," Che had dropped his head and shook it sadly. "Mr. Spencer," he said gravely, "you forget, we know Jack. We've worked with him. He is a cad, much like you." With a dark smirk, he added, "What is it he used to say? 'You can't snow the snowman'?"

Shawn thought about this for a brief second. "Are you saying you're a snowman? Dang, I didn't know they could survive in places as warm as Argentina, but—"

"Carlos," Che barked out, and one of his goons stepped forward. Shawn didn't know if he disliked the bulging muscles or the raw hatred he saw on the man's face more. Señor Che sent Carlos a nasty, pointed look and said, "Not the head."

"Wait," Shawn said, desperation tinging his voice as Carlos stalked toward him like a giant, ungraceful cat. "We can work something out. How about we play twenty questions? I'm thinking of where the treasure is; you guys ask me questions and try to guess where it is. Ready? G—" He broke off with a scream of pain as Carlos, in one fluid motion, grabbed the middle and ring fingers on Shawn's right hand and snapped them backwards with a series of sickening pops.

The world around Shawn danced frenetically like a kaleidoscope on a murderous rampage. Another tear dripped down, mingling with the drying blood on his face. He dipped his head, screwed his eyes shut, and clenched his teeth together, both to try to ride out the pain and to prevent himself from saying something else he'd regret.

Suddenly, there was a sharp pain in his head as a rough hand rooted itself in his fabulous hair and wrenched his head backwards. "Look at me," came a deadly quiet voice from somewhere in front of him. Forcing back the nausea that threatened to introduce Señor Che to that that burrito he'd had earlier, Shawn squinted his swollen eyes open and found himself looking into the dark, merciless eyes of Señor Che. Mark must have been the one was pulling his hair; he'd disappeared from the scene, and Che filled up Shawn's line of vision with his cruelly handsome face. "Mr. Spencer, this could be over right now. If you tell us where to find the treasure, and who has it, we'll let you go. Simple. Just tell us where Buchard's treasure is."

Shawn wanted to tell him that Gus had had the gold in his coat the whole time. He wanted to shout that it would be in the custody of the police department now, under lock and key, and that they'd never get it. As soon as he'd given them what they needed, he knew he was dead, and he couldn't risk telling them the truth in the hopes that they'd try to trade him off to the PD for the gold, either, because he'd be putting Gus at risk. Besides, he knew that the police didn't – couldn't – negotiate with kidnappers.

No, if Shawn wanted to survive this and ensure the safety of his friends, he'd have to level the playing field a bit. He thought frantically, knowing that he had to find a way to both get his kidnappers where he wanted them and also let his friends know where they were going to be. His head screamed at him, and a high-pitched ringing filled his ears. The pain from his hand was unbearable – he couldn't focus. He couldn't _think_! He needed _time_ , he needed–

Over the din in his own mind, and the distant ringing that grew louder by the moment, Shawn heard one sound that resonated above all others. It was the hammer of a gun being cocked.

The world moved in slow motion as Shawn snapped his head around the best he could and saw with ice clawing at his bones Señor Che aiming his gun at Shawn's right kneecap, his finger poised over the trigger. "You have ten seconds," the man informed him, voice cold and uncompromising, "or I shoot your kneecap off."

He started to count.

Shawn, eyes never leaving the pistol, thought frantically, knowing that if that trigger were pulled, his entire life would change, if he even survived this. His dad had had an old police buddy who had been shot in the kneecap, years ago. He'd had surgery after surgery, been in rehab for months, and he'd sported a limp until the day he died. He'd been taken off of active duty, passed from desk job to desk job at the station. All that pain and recovery, all those surgeries, knee replacements… Officer Purty had still been able to walk, but it had changed the way he lived, limited what he could do. Shawn didn't want that.

He also really, _really_ didn't like pain.

So, near panic, as Che intoned, "two, one," and prepared to pull the trigger, Shawn gasped out, "I buried it in the woods! On the way to meet Uncle Jack. Just… just chill, dude. Don't shoot."

The finger decreased its pressure on the trigger marginally as its owner studied Shawn dubiously. "Why would you _bury_ it? You didn't have enough time." The finger tightened again.

"I did, I did have time!" Shawn gasped out, heart hammering like Gus's fists on the morgue door that one time Shawn had locked him in (he'd made it up and bought Gus a smoothie later, of which he'd taken his obligatory quarter-cup tax). "G—my friend, he helped me. He's a competitive gardener. Always carries a shovel, and is the state champion of fast hole digging." The lie was stupid, and Shawn was sure they were going to see right through it.

Mark spoke up. "His friend did have a trowel on him when we captured them earlier. We found it in his bag."

Shawn blinked, trying to keep his surprise off his face. Never had he been so happy to have a best friend who compulsively packed winter survival gear even in the summer. "I planned to go back for it later, after we'd handed the fake bag of gold to Jack."

The two men regarded him for a long time, and Shawn tried to keep a straight face despite the raw agony that was clawing at the pain receptors all over his battered body. "Okay," Señor Che finally decided after a quick, harried discussion with Mark. "Where is it?"

Shawn took a deep, steadying breath. He'd had a small amount of time to think up his next move while they'd been holding conference about whether or not Shawn needed to keep his kneecap, and although it was extremely risky, he thought he had figured it out. "I can't tell you." The gun was cocked and raised again, right back at his kneecap. "WHOA!" Shawn shouted. "Give it two seconds, Señor MacShootypants! I can't tell you, because I'm terrible at directions. And I can't read maps, not with my mortal eyes. My psychic eyes, sometimes, but the wind conditions have to be just right and we're headed for a downdraft and – WAIT, DON'T SHOOT! – I have to _show_ you where it's at. I can take you there. That is, if you let me keep my knee, which I've been told is kind of necessary for walking."

This time, when Mark and Señor Che exchanged glances, Shawn knew he had won. Now, he just had to convince them to contact Jack to nullify the ransom because Shawn was going to take them to where the treasure was buried – and maybe, with any amount of luck at all, Gus would be there, and he'd figure it out.

Shawn ignored the pain in his hand, head, and face as he got ready to put his silver tongue to work. He played the _MacGyver_ theme song though his head the whole time he worked his magic.


	4. Part Four

"Why would Shawn tell them he buried the gold?" Gus asked, bewildered. "He _didn't_ bury the gold! He didn't have _time_ to bury the gold! He's going to get himself _killed_!"

"I think he was trying to prevent that from happening," Henry responded grimly.

Lassiter grunted. "Apparently even Spencer's got the brains to know that as soon as he tells them what they want to know, they'll kill him." He ignored Henry's wince, Gus's nervous whinny, and Jack's ever-slumping shoulders. "He's trying to buy time."

"But what good is time going to do him if they're going to find out the truth as soon as they realize he's led them on a wild goose chase?" Juliet mused, tapping her fingernails on the conference table.

Henry sighed. "Shawn's always been a kid who lives in the present. He doesn't really give a rat's ass about what's going to happen next as long as he's stalled long enough to stay out of trouble in the right now." He heaved a weary sigh, scrubbed a hand over his face, and sent Jack a death glare from across the table. For a split second, his calm façade slipped, and he crashed his fist down on the tabletop. " _Damn it,_ Jack!" he cursed. Jack shrank lower into his seat.

"Do we have any idea where Shawn might lead them?" the chief asked, her lips tight with barely-concealed concern. "Could Mr. Spencer be trying to clue us in on where they will be?"

"I don't see how," Lassiter grumbled. "He couldn't've counted on the kidnappers to contact us, after all."

"You'd be surprised." Everyone's eyes snapped up and onto the face of Jack, who had spoken for the first time since the kidnappers' call. "That kid's got a silver tongue. He could probably convince Al Capone to turn himself in if he had half a chance. He's got a way of getting in your head."

Silence as the chief, detectives, Henry, and Gus glared at Jack with varying degrees of distaste.

It was Lassiter who broke the uncomfortable quiet. "We're talking about the same Spencer here, right? The one who, just yesterday, had a fifteen-minute argument with Dobson about whether or not cheese puffs can be considered a health food?"

Henry snorted humorlessly, while Juliet hastily attempted to cover a smirk. "Believe it or not," the older Spencer conceded, massaging the bridge of his nose, "Shawn may have a real talent of being an idiot and pissing people off, but he's got a way with words. I don't think he'd still be alive if he didn't, with all the stupid messes he gets himself into."

Henry's words served to sober the atmosphere in the room even more, the reminder that Shawn was once again in a life and death situation hanging heavily over the group's heads.

Gus piped up, "One time, he convinced me that my belly button was a third, inverted nipple." All eyes migrated to Gus's face, which was suddenly turning a magnificent shade of magenta. "I was five," he said in his defense, and the group's collective eyebrows rose higher. At the withering look Lassiter gave him, and the scowl on Henry's face, he added defensively, "I'm nervous, okay? I'm a compulsive truth-teller when nervous!"

Lassiter rolled his eyes, seeming to savor the utter disdain that dripped like bacon grease from the expression. "All right," he said after his baby blues had made a full circuit in their sockets, his voice now all-business, "we don't have time to do this right now. If the kidnappers are telling the truth, Spencer's not got much longer to stall, and we've got no clue where they're taking him. Unless _Jack_ –" he spat out the wayward Spencer's name like it was comprised of moldy gym shorts, "– is right and Shawn was trying to give us a clue or message as to where he might be leading them." No one commented on the fact that the detective called the psychic by his first name, nor on the concerned crease between his stark Irish eyebrows, but they all noticed it. It made the situation feel even direr.

"Gus, is there _anywhere_ you can think of that he might take the kidnappers to?" Juliet asked fervently. "Anywhere you might have passed when you were running from them, anywhere he might have known you would remember? Maybe where you stopped to switch out the gold?"

At the mention of the ruse he'd been subject to, Jack Spencer stiffened the tiniest bit at Juliet's words, but quickly hunched back down into a position of attempted invisibility at the combined heat of the glares shot his way by Lassiter, Vick, and Henry.

Gus gnawed anxiously on his lower lip, thinking hard. "We didn't stop in one place," he finally replied, despondency running rampant in his tone. "We just kind of switched them out with rocks we found as we ran. We didn't have time to do it all at once."

Henry dropped his head into his hands and swore. "Did you stop somewhere else, or do you remember a landmark for any other reason? Maybe he pointed out a particular tree or rock formation?"

Gus shook his head, absolutely miserable. "Nothing. We didn't exactly have time to look at the scenery. We were running for our lives." He scowled half-heartedly. "Which would have been much easier to do, by the way, if we hadn't had to leave my Puma behind." His eyes widened. "My shoe!" he gasped.

"Guster, now is not the time to start whining about your missing footwear," Lassiter snapped irritably.

"No, Lassie, I figured it out! The only place we stopped for any length of time at all on the way was when my Puma got stuck in the mud hole and Shawn made me leave it behind – I bet that's where he's leading him; he _knew_ I'd remember because the trauma of losing my shoe during a race for my life is seared forever in my brain!"

Ignoring the melodramatic rhetoric spewing from Gus's anxiety, Henry sprang to his feet. "Do you remember how to get there?"

"Hell yes," came Gus's emphatic response. "Like I said, seared forever. Those shoes were dope."

Lassiter exchanged a quick, affirming glance with the chief, who nodded minutely in response, then ground out through gritted teeth, "Guster, you'll ride with O'Hara and I; we'll need you to show us the way."

"I'm coming too," Henry said tersely, and even though he was obviously displeased with the demand, Lassiter only nodded curtly and bustled out of the room.

Henry started to follow when Jack piped up, "What about me?"

"You, Mr. Spencer, are going to stay right here until this thing is resolved," the chief answered before a red-faced Henry could rip into his foolish younger brother. "And I would suggest you spend that time praying that Shawn makes it out of this unharmed, because make no mistake, this is _your_ doing, and you will be held responsible if…" She trailed off, her eyes momentarily clouded with a foreign emotion eerily similar to fear. "If he is not," she finished lamely, but the cold glare she sent his way more than made up for her temporary hesitation.

Jack's eyes widened then lowered to the tabletop as his brother and Chief Vick bustled out of the room, leaving him alone with his guilt.

"C'mon, kid," he muttered, twisting his fingers together nervously in an accurate dramatization of what was going on in his gut. "You've gotta pull through this."

And Jack Spencer, normally not a praying man, took the chief's advice, knowing that if something happened to his nephew, it would be his fault, and he would never, ever be able to forgive himself.

* * *

The ride to the "hiding spot" was easily the most uncomfortable of his life. And that included the time when he was eight and his father forced him to go on yet another fishing trip, where they caught a fifteen pound catfish too big for their cooler that Henry had proceeded to load into the plastic covered backseat with Shawn. Poor, traumatized Shawn had had to share the backseat with the ugly, deceased, gaping monster, with the explicit instructions to "keep hold of it, Shawn; don't let it slide around too much, and stop whining, it's just a fish." That fish was one of Henry's proudest and most cherished memories. That same fish still sometimes visited Shawn in his nightmares.

But this was worse.

For one, the pain radiating all over his poor, abused body had reached its crescendo. His broken fingers were the worst, as Mark had callously tied his hands behind his back as soon as he was freed from the chair, paying no mind to the throbbing bones getting squeezed and jostled. Then they'd herded him out to the car, and this time, he'd been awarded the pleasure of sitting in a seat instead of the trunk so he could navigate. Honestly, he would have preferred the trunk, though, because he wouldn't be sitting with his broken fingers smashed cruelly between his back and the seat of the car, not to mention, he wouldn't have had to deal with the thug he'd dubbed Rufus's gun digging into his ribs on the left and the barrel of Carlos's resting lightly but threateningly on his right kneecap.

Señor Che (Shawn distantly thought that he really should learn the dude's real name, so he'd know exactly who he was soon going to be sending to prison, but when they hit a pothole and Rufus's gun dug involuntarily deeper into his ribs, eliciting a grunt of pain, he decided it really wasn't all that important right now) was driving, with his new buddy Mark in the passenger seat.

The other two goons were staying at home base, under orders to "keep watch and shoot any intruders on sight," but Shawn suspected that they were just going to be in the way if they came, but the others didn't want to hurt their feelings and so gave them another job to make them feel important. Shawn had to stop himself from snorting in laughter at the thought. If the way he had been treated was any inclination, concepts like consideration or even simple politeness weren't even in his captors' vocabulary.

He tried to get his captors talking for the first five minutes of the ride, but they would have none of that. Carlos squeezed his arm hard enough to bruise, and when that didn't work, they decided they'd stuff a wad of cloth into his mouth until they got closer to their destination – they knew the general area, near where they'd grabbed Shawn initially, but they would need directions once they got there. And so Shawn was left without even the option of distracting himself with nonsensical babbling as he sat back, guns digging into him on both sides, fingers broken and squashed behind his back, and breathing heavily through his nose and cringing against the foul taste of the gag as he tried to stay calm. He hadn't been able to give any more specific clues to where he had "buried" the treasure, and he hoped that the short, bragging phone call to his uncle would be enough for Gus to guess that Shawn was taking them to the only spot they'd stopped at for any length of time during the chase – the spot where Gus had lost his shoe.

A terrible thought overcame Shawn then. What if Jack hadn't gone to the police station? What if the call hadn't been enough to convince him to turn around and face the music of what he'd done? What if he did what he always seemed to do when things got tough – run away? What if Gus never got the message? Gus was his only hope, and if he –

Shawn stopped himself right there, before the panic could take any more of a hold on him. It was hard enough to breathe as it was, gagged and with a broken nose that was more than a little reluctant to let any air pass through without a considerable amount of pain, and hyperventilating wasn't going to help any at all. It's just – he'd never been in this much trouble before. Sure, he'd been in some pretty dangerous situations, but he'd always had Gus right there with him, and the outlook had never been so dire. And never, never had he been denied the ability of talking to work things out in his head or distract himself – or his captors – until he could think of a plan.

And, quite frankly, it scared the _hell_ out of him.

* * *

Señor Che and Mark were the jerkiest jerk faces to ever kidnap someone and hold them for ransom for Spanish gold.

After they got to the place Shawn had indicated – _Please let Lassie and Jules be hiding behind a tree, ready to ambush them and save me_ – they untied his hands, thrust a shovel into them, and told him to start digging.

"I'm sorry," Shawn said, as politely as he could possibly manage after having been through these guys' version of hell, "I must have misheard you. You want me to dig? With what hands?" He indicated his right hand, two fingers of which were painful to look at and even more painful to have attached to one's pain receptors. They were bent and twisted like mangrove trees, except these trees must have been covered in mold, because they were a disgusting mottled arrangement of black and blue. They were also swollen twice their normal size. Shawn couldn't move them at all, and he certainly couldn't grip anything with them. They'd screwed up his fingers, big time, and he could only hope that if he got out of this, this injury wouldn't affect his finger-to-the-head psychic abilities.

He pointedly ignored his inner-Gus (and how disturbing was it that he discovered that he had an inner-Gus?) that reminded him that, "A, you aren't psychic, and B, even if you were, you wouldn't draw power from your fingers. _Real_ psychics' power comes from their mind." To which Shawn would have replied, "But _real_ psychics could never achieve hair this soft and shiny. It's _mind_ over matter really. Geddit, Gus?" To which inner-Gus would retort, "You can't just say a phrase with a word in it that has no bearing on the situation and call it a pun. Puns are funny because the word used is able to be used dually, and connected to both connotations," or some such nonsense.

Shawn imagined this little dialogue as he slowly, painfully using his left hand and the three remaining fingers of his right hand, started digging a few yards away from the mud hole where, somewhere beneath the disgusting muck, Gus's poor departed Puma lay at rest. Inner-Gus told him to forget the treasure and dive into the mud and save his shoe. Shawn, somewhat afraid that in his pain was beginning to lose it a little bit, told inner-Gus to suck it. It _did_ give him an idea though. Not a very good idea, but, if all else failed and Gus didn't get his message and come to the rescue like a chocolatey Batman, maybe he could somehow one-handedly attack the men and push them into the mud, where they'd get stuck and he could run…

Except there were four men, three of which had their guns trained on him, the other – the one Shawn had named Rufus – had another shovel and was blessedly helping Shawn dig (but Shawn had a nasty feeling that the only reason he was being a helper was because Shawn was moving much too slowly with his gimp hand and they wanted that treasure _now!_ Shawn was conflicted about receiving Rufus's help, because on the one hand ( _ha! Take that, inner-Gus – that's a pun worth fist bumping over_ ), his fingers were killing him and he could barely stay upright because of the pain and dizziness in his head, but on the other hand, he knew that the faster they dug the area up, the faster they'd learn that there was indeed no treasure, and the sooner he'd be buried in the very hole he was now digging up.

Stealing a quick furtive glance around him, he watched and waited, but didn't see any sign of his friends anywhere nearby. _Lassie,_ Shawn thought somewhat hysterically, _you'd better be_ damn _good at hide and seek._

* * *

Shawn couldn't know it at the time, but Lassiter had, in fact, been the hide-and-seek champion four years running in elementary school. He was so good, in fact, that the other kids often forgot to keep looking and left him in his hiding place until a teacher came searching. But that was neither here nor there.

Lassiter was, at the moment, silently padding through the underbrush like the pro he was, avoiding the pitfalls of crinkly leaves or snappy twigs. O'Hara was just behind him, equally stealthy, like a really talented cat in high heels. Guster was, for once, thank God, listening to reason, staying back at the car because he couldn't move as silently as the detectives and thus might give away their position and put Shawn in more danger. Spencer, however, much to Lassiter's disdain, was also quite adept at sneaking himself after having been a cop for so long, and was much harder to bully into submission than Guster was. So unfortunately for the detective, he'd not had the time to make Henry stay with Gus, and the eldest Spencer was moving stealthily behind them. Needless to say, Lassiter was less than impressed with the situation.

He just didn't get the Spencers, he mused crabbily as they moved along. They did nothing but argue, take cheap shots at one another, and, when they were apart, complain about one another, but when one of them was in danger, the other would knock down hell's gates to get the other back safely. He supposed it was a case of "it's complicated"; he knew enough about those kinds of relationships from his own childhood, but in all honesty, both Shawn and Henry got on his nerves to such an extent that he found even their relatively normal familial dysfunction much more irritating than it should have been.

Lassiter shook himself mentally and prepared for the task at hand. He spent enough time at the station and on cases actually dealing with Shawn. He sure as hell wasn't going to waste his time apart from the moron thinking about him! Except, it was hard _not_ to think about him right now, because they were trying to rescue him from some pretty desperate kidnappers, and Lassiter knew from his experience with these kinds of things that Spencer might very well not be in the best shape when they found him. And for some godforsaken reason that the head detective couldn't even fathom, he was much more bothered than he thought he should be by this fact. Well, just because he despised Spencer didn't mean he wished any … _much_ … harm to come to him. Finally, he reasoned that if he didn't get to be the one to kick Spencer's ass, then no one else should, either.

They had been walking in the direction Guster had indicated for a good ten, fifteen minutes by now, and still there was no sign of life. If Guster was wrong, and Spencer hadn't had a plan, hadn't been coming this way, then…

Then they'd have absolutely no leads to go on. They'd keep searching, but the chances that they'd find anything in time to bring Shawn back alive would dwindle exponentially with every false lead. Part of the detective wished they'd been able to bring more backup with them, just in case things got ugly, but they couldn't risk bringing police vehicles any closer for the same reason that Guster had to stay behind, and the more people tromping – even if they were stealthily tromping – through the woods looking for Spencer, the more chance they had of being discovered and losing the element of surprise. But still, they could cover more ground if they had more men.

Lassiter's train of thought was cut off abruptly when he caught the faintest whisper of a sound coming from somewhere in front of him. He stopped, held up his hand and motioned to O'Hara and Spencer to fan out and follow his lead. They did so, following the sounds that were gradually becoming more distinct. There were grunts, maybe of exertion, maybe of pain, and the grating sound of metal on earth, but there were no voices. But still, it meant that someone was nearby digging something up. That, or –

Lassiter tried not to think about the alternative, that someone was digging a hole to bury something – some _one_ – in, but it was difficult. When he glanced back at Spencer, he could tell from the father's grim face that he was thinking along the same lines and hating himself for it. O'Hara was on point, her face of mask of intense concentration. She was determined, he could tell, to bring the so-called psychic home alive. He hoped that she would not leave this place disappointed, but he also knew that it was a distinct possibility.

If Lassiter hadn't been a trained officer, he might have jumped at the sudden shout that resounded through the trees just a few dozen yards ahead of them.

" _THERE'S NOTHING HERE!_ "

Lassiter recognized the accented voice as the head of the false Mexican government agent, and he was seriously _pissed_. But it meant that he was pissed at someone, and the only person Lassiter knew that could make someone that mad so quickly was Spencer.

They continued to creep forward as a disturbingly weak voice protested, "Y-yes, there is, man. You're just not _looking_ hard enough."

The sound of a hand striking flesh, a grunt of pain.

On either side of him, Lassiter sensed O'Hara and Spencer tense at the obvious abuse. Thankfully, Spencer kept his wits about him, but Lassiter knew he was forcing himself to stay put. The detective himself, oddly enough, felt a strange spike of anger rise in his chest at the sound. He quickly disregarded the feeling as sympathy for his partner's distress, and inched closer, peering cautiously around a large oak to better assess the scene.

There was the mud hole, just like Guster had described it, and several yards away, near the edge of the small clearing, stood two of Jack's ex-partners and two of the false agents. And in between them, hands raised in submission, glancing nervously between the barrels of three different pistols, was Spencer. He didn't look _right_ , though. Something was definitely wrong, and it was more than the cruel slap he'd just been subjected to.

The young man was hunched over slightly, wavering on his feet like he'd had just a bit too much to drink, and although his hands were raised, he was clutching his right one a little closer to his chest. From his vantage point, Lassiter could see that at least one, maybe more, of the fingers on that hand had been brutally broken. _Bastards._

"Look, man," Spencer stuttered, his voice trembling, from fear, fatigue, or pain, Lassiter didn't know, but he could tell that if they didn't act soon, something bad was about to go down. Exchanging a quick glance with Spencer and O'Hara, he silently drew his gun, motioned for them to move forward on his signal, and got ready to move in at the first opportunity.


	5. Part Five

Shawn was in some deep, deep trouble. Deeper, even, than Gus's Puma, which had to be nearing the earth's core by this point (and, inner-Gus, FYI, he didn't _care_ that that's not how mud holes worked). He held his hands above his head, the right one trembling in pain. His jaw stung where he'd just been backhanded brutally by Mark. Wavering on his feet, he knew he couldn't stand much longer. Not that it would be a problem in the near future if something didn't change. As it was, he didn't even have to be psychic to know that he was moments away from being shot and buried in the hole he'd just painstakingly dug to uncover an imaginary treasure.

"Look man," he said, forcing himself to maintain eye contact with Señor Che, as he seemed to be the most volatile at the moment, with his wide, mad eyes and tomato-red face, "I—I think I t-told you the wrong place – _accidentally,_ man, _don't shoot!_ " He took a deep, steadying breath as Che's finger inched back slightly from the trigger. "All this forest l-looks the same, man, and in case you f-forgot, I've got a couple busted fingers that are m-making it hard to think. M-maybe it was over th-there—" He turned slightly to the left, gesturing with his uninjured arm to the base of a tree that pretty much looked identical to every other one in the woods.

 _CRACK_.

Apparently, sound must travel faster than pain, Shawn found himself thinking as he watched, almost detached, as the gun fired, spitting a bullet into his left bicep like a grade school bully with a spitball. He watched with disgusted, light-headed fascination as the bullet ripped through the fabric of his shirt, then through the fabric of his flesh, muscle, and straight into the bone, a dark red halo of red blossoming angrily from the wound.

 _Then_ the pain came, like fire and ice mixed together in some grotesque cocktail of torture and hatred. Shawn screamed at the sudden onset, clamping the palm of his right hand over the wound and feeling hot blood flow against his skin. At least one good thing came from getting shot, he thought dully as he swayed precariously on his feet, head somehow managing to be lighter than air and heavier than lead at the same time. He wasn't thinking about his broken fingers anymore.

"Spencer!" He forced his head up to meet the steely gaze of Señor Che, whose gun was now levelled at his right kneecap. "Where is the gold?"

Shawn could barely comprehend the man's words beneath the debilitating waves of pain and the odd rushing in his ears. _Odd. I didn't realize I was at the beach. Shoulda told Jules to wear a bikini…_

" _Where did you bury it?_ "

Shawn blinked at Mark, who had echoed his Spanish counterpart with the question. _Gold?_ Black fog was swelling in his mind, curdling his vision, and the rushing tide was getting louder and louder, threatening to overtake him at any second…

 _CRACK_.

The sound of the gunshot jerked Shawn back into a state of semi-awareness, and he flinched back, teetering, eyes roaming his body, waiting for another welling of blood from a wound he just couldn't feel yet. But nothing came.

Instead, as he watched, Señor Che slid to the ground, the gunshot wound in his chest leaking out onto the forest floor. _Funny,_ thought Shawn as he eyed the blooming crimson spreading from Che's chest, _I don't remember_ that _being there before._ Ice crept over his skin, freezing him from the inside, sending painful, wracking shivers in shockwaves all over his abused body. He stumbled back, falling, falling, and then was caught at the last moment from behind, held up against a muscled chest.

 _Good catch_ , he congratulated his rescuer blearily, but decided to rethink his thanks when he felt something cold and hard was ground into his temple. Even in his state of shock, Shawn was easily able to recognize the feel of the unforgiving barrel of a pistol.

* * *

Detective Lassiter got his chance to take out the man closest to Spencer. Unfortunately, that chance only came after the false Mexican agent had shot the psychic in the arm.

" _Detective_!" He didn't move at the anguished hiss from the eldest Spencer a few yards from his own position, but he knew that Henry was barely maintaining his composure at this point – hell, his son had just been _shot_ before his eyes. If Lassiter didn't take this bastard out, Henry was going to rush out into the fray, training and protocol be damned, and probably get _himself_ shot trying to save his son. So in the second it took for the man to prepare the next shot and point it at Spencer's kneecap, Lassiter had shot the man in the chest.

No one expected Jack's partner Mark to be as quick, agile, or quick-thinking as he was in that moment. In the time it took for Lassiter, O'Hara, and Spencer to charge into the clearing, each one of their weapons pointing at a different one of the three remaining men, Mark had lunged forward, snagged a drowsy Shawn before he hit the ground, and had a gun to his head.

"Come any closer," the man said, desperation coating his voice, "and I kill him."

* * *

Henry stood helplessly as his idiot brother's ex-partner began to back away slowly, dragging a limp and barely conscious Shawn with him. He tightened his grip on his own handgun, knowing that Detectives Lassiter and O'Hara were doing the same – looking for an opening, any chance they had to take out the kidnapper and rescue the hostage. Although he knew that there was nothing that Lassiter could have done to prevent what had just happened – the false agent had moved like a viper, without warning, and there'd been no time to stop him once that trigger had been pulled. The head detective did take the first opportunity to shoot the bastard when he was momentarily occupied with readying the next shot; even Henry could not find fault in the detective's quick and accurate shot.

Henry focused his gaze on the kidnapper's face, despite wanting nothing more than to look at his son to assess his condition, lend him whatever meager support a resented father's gaze could muster, assure Shawn that it was going to be all right. Unfortunately, he couldn't afford to take his eyes off of Jack's ex-partner for even a fraction of a second, and so he resolutely held gaze and gun on the man, while his mind yearned to seek out and comfort his injured son.

"Let him go," the retired officer ordered steadily, despite knowing that his words would fall on deaf ears. He recognized the look in Mark's eyes – he'd seen it in the face of far too many desperate criminals.

"Stand down," Lassiter supplemented, his voice like stone. "You've got nowhere to go."

"I swear, I _will_ kill him!" Mark all but shrieked, tightening his grip around Shawn's chest, eliciting a small moan of discomfort. "Lower your weapons, turn around, and let us leave, and the kid won't die right in front of your eyes."

"You know we can't do that," Detective O'Hara's voice rang out from somewhere to the right, surprisingly steady, though his trained ear could detect a tiny tremor of anxiety, "and if you shoot, you will lose your leverage. Surrender now; don't make this any harder than it has to be."

"Don't test me," Mark ground out, but he stopped backing away. The men on either side of him mimicked his actions, though Henry could see from the tautness in their calves that they were ready to bound away at the first opportunity. "This smartass certainly has, and it would give me great pleasure to send a bullet through his skull. I mean it; weapons down, or _he … dies … NOW_."

* * *

Shawn's senses were on the fritz, going in and out of focus, sometimes cutting out completely before wandering back into the picture, like, _Oh, hey, sorry. Did you need us for something_? The only sensation that stayed constant was the pain, hot sparks of agony resonating in his arm, head, hand – and discomfort in his chest where something was wrapped around him, squeezing him, pulling him close. He struggled to remember where he was and what had happened, but it wasn't until his hearing decided to once again join the party that he heard a familiar voice and a sliver of awareness jolted back into his fuzzy, pain-wracked mind. _Dad._

Just three words – _Let him go_ – but he latched on to them with everything he had left, cracked his eyes open marginally, and assessed his predicament the best he could. From what he could tell from his vantage point, this definitely looked like it was a textbook hostage situation. He could see one of his captor's muscular arm snaked around his chest, could feel the barrel of the pistol against his forehead, could see his dad, Lassie, and Jules in a semi-circle facing him, guns out, could hear Marky-moo's order to relinquish their weapons or else. And beside Shawn and his captor, to the left and slightly behind, was the mud puddle that had eaten Gus's shoe.

The sight of the mud hole recalled an earlier memory to Shawn's mind – a thought he'd had previously, a half-baked plan that was almost doomed to failure before it was even attempted. In his befuddled state, however, the fake psychic forgot about the "half-baked" part and impulsively put his plan into action.

Without another second to spare, he threw his body weight back with as much strength as he could muster, leaning to the left with all his might.

And he and Mark did a sideways synchronized swan dive into the mud puddle.

* * *

The next thirty seconds were absolute chaos. Before the detectives and Henry could react to the gunman's ultimatum, Shawn's limp body suddenly stiffened, and with what looked like every ounce of strength he had left, he flung himself back against his captor, and the two ungracefully tumbled back and into a great sticky mud hole to the left.

"Shawn!" Henry yelled, having to wrestle his panic under control at the sound of a gun's report. Without a second thought, he lunged forward, dropping to his knees beside the squelchy mud, and pulled his son from the foul goop. Shawn was lying on top of a squirming Mark, and wasn't moving. His eyes were closed, and his face was deathly pale, and there was blood on his cheek.

With trembling hands, Henry plucked the pistol from where it had landed in the mud a few inches away from Mark's grabbing fingers, tossed it in the general direction of Lassiter and O'Hara who were subduing the two henchmen, and promptly sat on the kidnapper, effectively stilling his struggles to extricate himself from the sticky puddle. The anxious father cleared the muck from his son's face the best that he could, nearly fainting with relief when he saw that the bullet had missed Shawn's head – his idiot son must have jarred it when he decided to take matters into his own hands – and had merely gazed a shallow groove across his right cheekbone. Blood oozed from the cut, but it was minor, and Shawn was breathing, if unconscious, and the perp's struggling beneath Henry was slowing…

It was over.

Thank _God_ , it was over.

* * *

Gus, back at the car, heard the sharp report of gunshots and was barely able to restrain himself from running and screaming – either toward them in a pitiful attempt to save his best friend, or away in an even more pitiful attempt to save himself – by convincing himself that what he was hearing were the melodic notes of justice being doled out to the jerks who had kidnapped his friend.

It seemed like hours later – though it could have only been thirty or forty-five minutes – that he heard the wail of an ambulance and a cacophony of other sirens on the main road, and then, another half-hour later, the sound of haggard footsteps approaching his direction.

Gus ducked down behind the front seat of the car, wary of any nefarious goons coming to further ruin his day, but sank back in relief when he saw it was a very muddy and bedraggled Lassie and Jules trudging out of the trees. Lassie had something clutched in his hands, and he had an extremely unhappy look on his mud-splattered face, but Juliet's eyes, though subdued, were not defeated, and Gus knew that Shawn was going to be okay.

He scrambled out of the car to meet the detectives, spewing questions faster than he could coherently form them, resulting in a jumbled mess of high-pitched squeals. Thankfully, Juliet seemed to know what he was trying to communicate and answered his implied questions with restrained patience. "Shawn is going to be okay, Gus – Mr. Spencer is riding with him in the ambulance to the hospital. We've got the four kidnappers who were here, and Shawn was able to tell us where the other two are hiding out, so we've got a team going that way right now."

Gus opened his mouth and blurted out another incoherent mess of words, which Juliet skillfully translated. "Like I said, Gus, the paramedics said Shawn will be fine eventually. He has a concussion, some broken fingers, and a gunshot wound that fractured his arm, but—"

"Shawn was _shot_?!" Gus cried weakly.

"He'll be fine, Guster," Lassiter piped in, though there was an unidentifiable kind of weariness on his face, faint lines that, had it not been Lassie, Gus would have been convinced spoke of concern. "It was a flesh wound."

Gus breathed deeply, heart still beating a frenzied tattoo in his chest, but the tightness easing somewhat in his gut. He wouldn't be able to totally relax until he actually saw and spoke with Shawn, but hearing the detectives' reassurances did calm him somewhat.

Though still concerned, he looked curiously at the mud-coated object in Lassie's hands. "What's that?"

Lassiter rolled his eyes. "Spencer was clutching this for dear life when we dragged him all the way out of the mud; God knows how he managed to fish it out when he did." He thrust the whatever-it-was into Gus's hands, his upper lip curling with disgust. "He insisted that we give it to you when we saw you."

Astonishment quickly overtaking the disdain at the mud now oozing over his hands, Gus wiped some of the mud off of the surface of the object and laughed out loud. "Holy crap," he chortled, while Lassiter and Juliet looked on with looks of irritation and amusement on their respective faces. "Shawn found my Puma!"

* * *

Jack, for the record, did _not_ want to do this, and it wasn't because he was a terrible person or a coward or anything, like his self-righteous brother was determined to believe, but rather, because, well…

Okay, maybe he was a coward, but how did Henry expect him to face Shawn after all the kid had been through? Just one off-handed assumption about the nature of his ex-partners, an empty and false reassurance that once they knew Shawn didn't have the gold, they'd leave him alone, had gotten the kid kidnapped, beat up, and shot. Jack never meant for things to go this far, and, though he never meant for it to happen, it was so easy to forget that Shawn was his little nephew when they teamed up instead of another partner.

And truth be told, Jack Spencer was ashamed of this fact.

But Henry was right; he did owe it to Shawn to at least attempt to apologize before he skipped town again; ironic, really, that Henry was so dead-set on Jack's apologizing but equally adamant that he wanted his brother to stay the hell away from Shawn in the future. Something about giving Shawn closure or something. Jack had only been half-listening to the lecture, consumed as he was in his own miserable guilt.

Jack breathed deeply, then considered his options. Maybe if he slipped out, right now, he—

The detective with the strong Irish hairline gave him a shove in the back toward the door, crossed his arms, and glared threateningly. Henry had sure picked the most intimidating guy on the force to babysit Jack until he saw his nephew, and though he seemed as equally displeased with the assignment of making sure Jack got to the hospital without bolting, he sure was taking his job seriously.

Jack flashed Detective Lassie his most charming grin, the one that had caused his nose to be broken on at least three different cities at various points in his adventures, and then turned and knocked on Shawn's door before he had to make it _four_.

Henry opened the door, a mask of (barely) subdued fury on his face. "He just woke up, and I've told him you're here, so don't even think about running off."

He made to squeeze past Jack through the doorway.

"Wait," Jack stammered, suddenly panicked. "You're not staying?"

"You owe it to Shawn to face up to your mistakes by yourself," Henry spat. "But," he added, jamming a finger (Jack was slightly surprised it wasn't the middle one) into Jack's face, "you keep it short and sweet, and then you can run away, like you always do – but don't you dare do or say anything to hurt Shawn worse than you already have."

"Henry, c'mon, I didn't mean –"

Henry looked past his younger brother without acknowledging Jack's words. "Detective Lassiter, can I get you a coffee?"

"Thanks, Henry. It's a small consolation for the job you and the chief volunteered me for, but I could definitely use the pick-me-up before I meet O'Hara back at the station."

They retreated down the hall, and Jack was left to face Shawn's hospital room alone.

* * *

The kid looked like hell. Nose swollen, he had dark bruises under both eyes, a bandaged gash on his right cheek, more bruising on his head and jaw, a splint on the middle and ring fingers of his right hand, and a full-arm, lime green cast on his left arm.

"Damn, Shawny," Jack whistled softly, and pretended that he didn't see Shawn flinch back slightly, hurt, as Jack used the familiar nickname. "They really did a number on you, huh, kiddo?"

The betrayal in Shawn's eyes cut Jack to the very core.

"Yeah," Shawn said slowly, his words slurring only slightly from the pain medication he was on. "Broken arm's the worst of it, though. Apparently, a bullet lodged in the bone can make a pretty nasty mess of your insides. Who knew, right?"

It was clear that Shawn was trying to keep things light, to hide behind that mask of indifference that Jack knew all too well – because he had the same mask – but he was unsuccessful. His voice shook slightly, and it wasn't because of the drugs.

"Kid, I'm—"

"Don't." The curt way Shawn snapped out the word actually made Jack pause.

"Shawn, I just—"

"Uncle Jack, just… forget it, okay? What's done is done, all right? That's life. _Mono y mono_."

Jack scratched at his chin nervously, then chuckled, "You mean _c'est la vie_?"

Shawn threw his uncle a scathing look that clearly communicated, _I've heard it both ways_ , but didn't argue the point. Instead, he sighed deeply, closed his eyes, and pretended to go to sleep."

Jack's shoulders slumped, and he slouched his way to the door. With his hand on the doorknob, ready to flee, Jack impulsively looked back at the bed and saw something that would haunt his conscience until the day he died. A single tear slid down Shawn's cheek.

 _Screw it_ , thought Jack, and he spun around, plopped himself down in the ungodly excuse for a seat by the bed, and said, "Sorry, kid, but you're not getting rid of me that easily. I have to say this – I can't _not_ say it, Shawn I—" A couple of tears threatened to dampen his own face. "I'm so sorry. I had my mind so focused on Buchard's treasure that I didn't think about what I was dragging you into. What I was leaving you to. I honestly didn't think they would hurt you—" he tried to ignore the way Shawn flinched at the reminder of his torment, "—but I shouldn't have taken the chance. You're a hell of a lot more important to me than any gold, kid. I don't blame you if you want me out of your life like your dad does, but, I just want you to know, well, I'm sorry," Jack finished lamely.

When Shawn didn't respond, he took that as his dismissal and stood to leave. He actually jumped in surprise when Shawn spoke again. "My father," Shawn said carefully, clearly fighting against the drugs in his system, "has a bug up his butt. I've told him time and again to get something done about it, but I think he's grown attached to it."

Hardly daring to hope that Shawn might be able to forgive him, Jack turned slowly on the spot to find Shawn's eyes, tired though they were, were open again and trained on him. There was no attempt to disguise the pain, betrayal, and distrust that shone at the forefront of the hazel gaze, but his words offered some measure of fondness. "I…" Shawn hesitated, licking his puffy lower lip. "I need time, and I need space. I don't know if I'll ever be able to trust you again, but…" He blinked hazily up at his uncle, "I don't want you out of my life for good, and I don't hate you, Uncle Jack. I just need…"

"Time," Jack finished for his nephew, equal parts relieved that Shawn would one day forgive him and disappointed that today wasn't the day. "I can do that, kid." Only hesitating for the briefest of moments, Jack leaned over and squeezed Shawn's uninjured shoulder affectionately. "Love ya kid. Get better. See ya around."

Shawn nodded minutely, his eyes uncharacteristically serious as they held Jack's uncommonly earnest stare. Jack managed a watery smile before he turned away, striding toward the door.

"Uncle Jack?"

He turned, saw Shawn about to drift off to sleep but still hanging on to tell him one last thing: "Take the elevator in the B wing. Dad's in the cafeteria in A wing, and I don't think you wanna see him right now."

Smiling at the warning, Jack chuckled softly, discreetly brushing under his eye with his thumb. "Thanks, Shawny."

Not today, he thought as he left the hospital and pulled out of the lot, but someday. And as much as he wished he could make things better right here and now, someday was good enough for Shawn, so it would have to be good enough for him, too.

**The End**


End file.
